beijing-a-ling (part 2)

i went to the silk market - a building with 5 floors of knockoff everything.

walking into these things is walking into a death trap

carolee would have gone nuts. purses, ipods, beats by dre, shoes… i’m so proud of myself for just buying a few souvenirs. well, it was either buy that crap or eat....so i guess it wasn't that hard of a decision

bahahahaha yeah right you crooks!

the salespeople there are hilarious! they pounce on you and say “hello friend, hello, hello, hello, shoes, shoes, shoes come in, buy shoes.” they are funny and I just say funny things back to them.

the salesmen write the prices on their calculators so that no one else in the store can hear when someone actually pays a fair price.

im getting a lot better at bargaining. it's actually kinda fun to me now. o how i love messing with them cuz they're so annoying

a guy did the biggest snot rocket right here in the forbidden city. keep it classy, china

in other countries they don’t start with such outrageously high prices so i always felt awkward bargaining. here they start with prices so i don’t feel bad bargaining hard at all.

-spencer's next victim-
 in beijing, a random art display of kuna lady. these ladies sell you cool indigenous stuff in panama

no luck finding grandpa

grandpa ping, is that you??

grandpa?

this looks more like grandpa ping to me

so people be so aggressive i just get aggressive back

one guy tried to block the entrance and trap me in his store so that id buy something. i physically pushed him out the doorway

flying tours of beijing. the wonders that you can do with money...

i love hostels. all my roommates were from different countries -  estonia, egypt, mexico, france, south korea, russia, israel and antarctica. i love talking to them.

dragon turtle's back!

the israeli walked in asked me in hebrew if i was Israeli. 
he said i looked more israeli than palestinian. that was a surprise. 
i think that's like that 40th race that someone's asked me if i am

her pose is much cooler than mine so she wins

after a while you get sick of big pretty temple buildings. it's like cathedrals in europe. youve seen a few, youve seen em all.

at the summer palace

saturday i went to jingshan park. the transit directions i received were wrong (like almost everywhere i went!) so it took a while to get there (also like everywhere else i went.) shoulda bought the lonely planet travel guide!

lots of cool buildings in the streets near tiananmen

Jinghsan park is the highest part of beijing. you can look out into the beautiful city as far as the smog will let you see

another benefit of the smog it also covers up my camera's week zoom

tuesday i went to the temple of heaven for a quick peek (so i thought.) it wasn't a temple it was actually a big park

friday i went to the summer palace - which again is a huge park with lots of cool buildings.
btw i should have been born a chinese aristocrat.

the marble boat! i was too lazy to walk closer

chinese is just starting to make sense to me. wish i could take classes. id love to go back to school if i could just take the classes i wanted

i always get curious and hop on and hop off random buses. i gotta stop doing that-i keep forgetting that it's much harder being lost in china than it is in other countries

sunday after church i went to area 798. it's beijing's art district. hipster alert!

dragon turtle! so cool!

so for the art distric they took an old factory complex and made it artsy

it's sad to say but chinese hipsters give me hope for the future of the country 

i think the art could be a lil more pleasing on the eyes tho

i felt like i was in america. im surprised the chinese government allows an art district

big brother. also didn't appreciate the fact that the websites i most use were blocked or slowed

i bet each gallery has to have each display approved by the government

im glad that there's some outsidethebox thinking and expression going on in china. this is good news

candy candy candy! if i had money i would have bought one of each! to me that's the definition of fun

 i lived in a hutong. they are ancient streets around Tienanmen square. so cool i felt like it was real china. at night they have such a cool feeling

many of the hutongs are being knocked down and they're building cool new touristy ones. i think they need to preserve the old ones, but some new ones are good cuz they're really cool looking

 china's economy will surpass the U.S economy this year. 

i wonder if this was inspired by Starwars Battlefront videogame

I'm not too worried about china YET because American culture, English, american military, and American innovation dominate (if obama dont ruin it. you ruiner!)

national theatre

also, do people like doing business with the chinese? i don't imagine it's too fun 

china first needs to get some priorities straight if it wants to be a world leader. they need some more tai chi, ying yang, and feng shui-whatever those things actually mean.
they need sumtin spiritual

china state tv (CCTV) building. i think this building was designed to be feng shui so that's cool

another thing. the only chinese brand that is a household name in america is lenovo, which actually used to belong to IBM.
how can the world's largest economy not have any brands that are recognized world-wide

ok so i gotta admit even tho they suppress creativity and thinking the commies have some cool modern architecture

even lil taiwan has big brand names in america like htc, asus, acer, and d link

tech museum

another thing. the english language is the world's lingua franca.

 i love english! its very versatile and has lots of unique sounds because of the influence that many other languages have had on it. also, a lot of synonyms to choose from

yeah, now i appreciate english a lot more

an art museum

china has a ton of awesome things to see. wouldn't want to live there tho.
im glad i went because it was a huge learning experience. next time 

if i hadn't gone to china, i wouldn't have learned what a fried tickle box is

and now i'm back in america!

- The end of Mr. Ping in Taiwan

Next blog: McKay in America

beijing-a-ling (part 1)

i got to ride the speed train to beijing! 193 mph!

there's a ton to do in beijing. much more than i expected

church was a district conference of 4 branches. there were a couple hundred people. i was surprised there were that many

looks mormon,/communist

lots of americans moving to china. especially ex mormon missionaries who speak chinese

the chinese members meet separately. the government doesn't let them be in the building at the same time as the other members

there's some crazy stuff in the air. like crazy metallic stuff. makes lots of acid rain. it also made my cough worse.

at least the smog makes the pix look cool

i talked with a family at church and they said they only let their kids play outside about once a week. with a mask 

awwww

i could live in shanghai but i don't think i could live in beijing. it's dirtier, polluted, and not westernized

i was expecting everyone to be wearing face masks like in taiwan. but they don’t.

i figured it out that the taiwanese are just hypocondriacs. they love to wear the face masks when they’re sick and they go to the doctor for every little thing. they have health clinics everywhere

copyright: McKay's Weddings (subsidiary of mckay's graphics, subsidiary of mckay's landscaping)

i should have invested in a lonely planet travel guide. would have made life a whole lot easier. i gotta stop being such a cheap-skate!


i figured there would be plenty of things of english, seeing that it’s the language of tourism and most things international.

mmmmm

but hardly anyone speaks english, not even at the central tourist locations! ive never been to a place like that before. 

byu beijing!

so it forced me to speak some chinese, which i don’t like cuz i sound like a gringo AND IT’S NEVER OK TO SOUND LIKE A GRINGO

i met some really cool people at the hostel. hung out with a group from the US, Germany, and ANTARCTICA! really, they live in antarctica!

tibetan-styled palace

i think it’d be really fun to run a hostel. they’re great (unless there’s non-westernized chinese people. they wake up early and make banging and crinkling noises as loud as they possibly can grrrrrrr you don't want to see me what i'm like when somebody disturbs my slumber!) anyway i love the vibe at hostels

Suzhou Street

monday i went to the national museum. i hate museums but mao mao was closed. however, the exhibit on gifts to chinese diplomates from other diplomats was cool. 

national museum

the middle-eastern gifts were the prettiest. muslims win my prize for world's prettiest decor

tuesday i went to see mao zedong (third attempt.) i was so mad at all of china that morning! people in the long line were soooo pushy. they were all up in my grill and they STANKY

presenting lil' mao mao: everyone's favorite lil mass murderer

that maosoleum had a really eerie feeling. it was very communist-looking. mao was in a dark room in a crystal coffin (like sleeping beauty how adorable) and there were fake flowers all around. creepy!

his body's in this building

a lady said that her husband was the greatest man in china, perhaps since mao zedong. crazy thought-  it's 2014 these people really don't know history! there's no way for them to learn cuz the government forbids it


Then I went to the Forbidden City. that was impressive. huge

everything in china is BIG! you think youre going to visit a place for a half hour. then it take 3 hours.

i guess that’s the way it has to be to accommodate 1.3 billion people.

olympic square

they went all out for the beijing 2008 olympics. the olympic park and buildings take up a huge chunk of the city center.

i was expecting to see a couple buildings but there was an entirely new section of the city and a big park. ( btw that 2008 opening ceremony was the best. nobody out shows the chinese! )

there are so many chinese tourists! as the country becomes richer, the people outside of the cities can afford to vacation now. bad news for western tourists cuz they are a pain!

awesome lampposts, olympic broadcasters tower

im getting better at walking right into people if they’re in my way. it was hard for me to do at first seeing that i don't even push when i play basketball! i also push away the salespeople if they get too close

im sick of spitting, farting, nose picking, and snot rockets. i think it's a national past-time, after tone-deaf karaoke singing

people here are amazing squatters. they can squat and eat a meal or make a phone call. they get all that practice from the toilet. i just don't go to the bathroom.

i went to the great wall using public transportation. people here are so sneaky. they put up fake bus stop signs and dress up as public transit workers and try to trick you into going with them.

pathetic pic of me trying to climb the wall

if you do take the right bus they get on later and trick you into getting off at the wrong stop (so that you have to pay them to take you there)

the great wall was surprisingly steep! I rode a kiddie-coaster down from the great wall

i like hiking up, but i hate going downhill. hard on the knees. o gosh, i sound like mom